Two administrative positions are officially off the books as Lehighton Area School District cuts expenses for the 2020-21 school year.

The district voted to eliminate the director of information technology and assistant business manager jobs during Monday’s board meeting.

Both positions were recommended by the administration to be cut during budget discussions in June, resulting in a savings of $154,189.

“This was part of our budget remediation plan to get us to a balanced budget for 2020-21,” Larry Stern, board president, said during the meeting.

The position cuts were part of a larger budget leveling plan that included removing transportation funding, a voluntary pay freeze by administrators, a 1.76-mill tax increase, and the elimination of certain extracurricular programs due to COVID-19 concerns.

Director David Bradley was the only board member not to approve the move, as he abstained from the vote after questioning the motives of the eliminations. The timing of removing the director of information technology, he said, was troubling when the high school will be on a hybrid reopening model and more students than normal may be choosing Lehighton’s cyber academy or virtual synchronous education plan at the elementary level.

“Of all places to cut back,” Bradley said, “this makes no sense. A lot of students struggled last spring with virtual learning and now we’re going into this school year down one key member of the team.”

Superintendent Jonathan Cleaver said Monday he couldn’t comment on specifics about why those two particular positions were chosen for elimination, calling it a personnel issue.

When asked by board member Gail Maholick who would be filling the director of information technology duties, Cleaver started to answer but Bradley said that question should be asked of the board, not the superintendent.

“We decide the number of employees,” Bradley said. “That process should be asked of the board.”

Reached on Tuesday, Cleaver said the duties for the positions eliminated Monday would be picked up by existing personnel.

Bradley also critiqued the district for eliminating the assistant business manager position. Lehighton’s chief business administrator, Patricia Denicola, is leaving to take the same post in another district in September.

“I don’t agree with your assessment,” Stern responded to Bradley. “We all wish we had the foresight of what would happen in the next few months. We had to take this action to move forward and we’ll try to recover the best we can. We have a dire financial situation and that is why these positions are being eliminated.”

Lehighton also voted to eliminate all lunch aide positions for the 2020-21 school year. Cleaver said high school students would be receiving lunch in their classrooms, while a plan is still being worked out for lunches at the middle school. Current full- and part-time staff will handle the oversight of elementary students at lunch, he added.

Bradley also abstained from that vote, saying he had not received information on how much money eliminating the lunch aide positions would save the district. Cleaver and Stern said that estimate was not readily available during Monday’s meeting.